Culture Club - "Colour by Numbers" (1983)

The definition of guilty pleasure (just look at that album cover!) but I can't deny that Colour by Numbers is a masterpiece of bubblegum pop (as long as we agree that a masterpiece of bubblegum pop probably still can't go beyond a 4 stars out of 5 rating). When I first listened to this record, I did find Boy George's whiny, 'soulful' vocals to be grating and didn't really give it a proper listen. But then "Karma Chameleon" was stuck in my head for long enough that I eventually decided it was worth giving it another chance. And indeed, pretty much every song here is memorable and catchy (in a good way), which satisfies the first (and maybe only) requirement of a great bubblegum record. Shockingly, they summon up some real soul as well on tracks like "Church of the Poison Mind" with great backing vocals from Helen Terry. Anyways, if you've heard "Karma Chameleon" and found it obnoxious, stay away. If you've heard "Karma Chameleon" and found yourself secretly enjoying it, then don't be afraid to pick up Colour by Numbers.

Emerson, Lake & Palmer - "Emerson, Lake & Palmer" (1970)

A keeper, but as I learned the hard way with Yes's Relayer, I wouldn't recommend playing this kind of music at parties. Like any self-respecting music critic who likes ELP (or are there any music critics who like ELP apart from amateur web reviewers?), I do feel conflicted about enjoying their music. And indeed, for about half of the first side of the record, I felt confident that I would be able to break from the shackles of my forefathers and deem this a blue bin album. But I felt the same way when listening to ELP's Tarkus, but eventually came to a grudging acceptance of the record. And lo, the same thing happened here!

For those who have never listened to ELP before, the issue is as following. This is prog-rock at its most proggy, with the music centered around piercing early 70s synthesizer solos. I don't particularly care for Emerson's synthesizer tone, seeing how it's aged about as well as Paul McCartney's voice, and though his playing is technically impressive, it is ridiculously overwrought. But the solos are not played with no greater end in mind. There is a diversity of moods, melodic hooks, and most importantly, the sense that these are actual compositions. Plus there are some piano solos every now and then! And most importantly, this album closes with "Lucky Man," a song which I have no compulsions about liking, and in a weird way, reminds me of Ween's The Mollusk (without the humor, of course). If you ever decide to give ELP a chance, start here.

Boz Scaggs - "Down Two Then Left" (1977)

I listened to Boz Scaggs' most acclaimed album (Silk Degrees) and felt lukewarm about it, so I expected to dislike Down Two Then Left. And I was right! This is not a terrible record, and I admit that the slick L.A. production works well with Scaggs' soul/funk/rock sound. There are some popping bass lines and nearly every track has a decent groove. But apart from "Lido Shuffle," Scaggs is incapable of writing any songs that I find catchy or memorable. Bin blue!

Original Soundtrack - "Arthur" (1981)

Probably the second-greatest album of all time entitled Arthur, but where the greatest album called Arthur would make my top 100 rock albums (the one by the Kinks), I plan to abandon this one in the imminent blue bin purge of 2012 (the bin is finally full!). Although I haven't seen the movie, I did see enough previews for the re-make starring Russell Brand to have very low expectations for this particular soundtrack.

I suppose my expectations were exceeded in that the overall quality of the vocal melodies (and string melodies on the all-instrumental second side) is pretty good. Burt Bacharach still had some talent in 1981, and perhaps, in a completely different context, these solid melodies could have resulted in some actual good songs. Alas, someone in the movie business decided that the ideal performers for these songs would be forgettable 80s acts like Christopher Cross and Ambrosia. The result is the arrangements are about as sappy and generic as possible, from the drooping adult contemporary of Stephen Bishop and Cross to the sub-Toto arena rock of Ambrosia. On the second side, some of the same themes are repeated with instrumental versions, which is preferable, but then again, also generic to the extreme, just with Hollywood classical replacing Hollywood pop-rock. Blue bin!

B.B. King - "Guess Who" (1972)

Slated for blue binning after a thumbs down review from my favorite online album critic (George Starostin), B.B. King's Guess Who became the subject of unexpected controversy in my household when my girlfriend told me that she had randomly played it and loved it and I immediately responded back with a link to Starostin's negative review. Not fair, perhaps, but I really do agree with Starostin a rather large percentage of the time and indeed, my fondness of his reviews no doubt has a lot to do with the fact that we share similar musical philosophies and tastes. 

And the most important musical philosophy we share is to actually listen to the record instead of judging it ahead of time (sounds obvious, but I have long suspected that allmusic.com and Rolling Stone do not always follow this principle). So much as I'd like to steal my friend Jonathan's witty pun about B.B. King standing for 'Blue Bin King' (okay, I already did steal it), I will be keeping this record, not that I wouldn't be anyways even if I hated it. My feeling, for what it's worth, is that G. Star. has a point regarding the fact that there is not a whole lot of guitar played on the record with the arrangements instead dominated by strings and horns. That's not to say that strings and horns are inherently a worse choice, but they are much less distinctive than when King brings out his trusted Lucille. But King is a good enough singer to make up for it, and when he does play guitar, he soars. Still, I will defend Starostin, as I could certainly see that in the midst of reviewing 44 B.B. King albums, this one probably wouldn't stand out.